I leave my air-cured tobacco hanging in the shed until spring most years, as a matter of convenience.
That is what I do with most of mine. In my climate, the spring, summer and fall months are no problem as it is generally very dry here. The only time I have had any problems with tobacco left hanging in my barn is during the winter if we have long periods of wet and foggy weather. Water can condense on the outer edges of strings and causes speckled mold spots.
I have aged tobacco about every way possible. Once the leaf has been thoroughly dried, you can bring it back into light case and pack the leaf into cardboard boxes to age. This works very well as cardboard will breath and allow air exchange. Stripping out the main stem saves space and eliminates the main source of mold, which is a stem that was not 100% dried before storage. Get that main stem DRY or strip it out. Many of us have made that mistake and lost tobacco.
I have also aged it after curing by fully processing it so it is ready to smoke. We flake our cigarette tobacco. It is much easier than shredding. Flaked or shredded is largely a matter of preference, especially with cigarette tobacco. We take cured leaf that is bone dry and out of case and crumble it up over a 1/4 mesh hardware cloth screen and into a plastic tote. We store and age it in the tote dry and out of case, or in very low case. It takes at least 6 months or more for bright leafs to age this way. Burleys may take longer depending on the strain.
To simplify it down to the basics, the aging of tobacco is a chemical reaction primarily between nitrogen compounds in the leaf and oxygen in the atmosphere. It will age at any temperature or moisture level, but as with all chemical reactions, it happens much quicker at higher temps than low ones. And it happens quicker in tobacco if some moisture is present. That is why a kiln can "age" tobacco in a month as opposed to the 6 months to a year natural aging takes.
Hope this helps you some,
Sky
